3 outlets, Smart Home Safety Protection, Energy Saving, 18W Fast Charging, USB-C, USB-A, Individual Control, Remote & Voice Control, Schedule & Timer, Away Mode
A tentative first step into home automation for me.
Price seems to be an Amazon all time low. I couldn't find any previous listing on OzB to compare.
CamelCamelCamel.
Thanks
Many Amazon reviews say wifi stopped working. Does your Tapo wifi still work?
I have a few of these and have been going strong for 3+ years - they are all thrown behind difficult to reach areas and work like a charm - no issues
Every single TP-Link device I have (and that's in the dozens) have worked perfectly with moderate daily use since installing them. That's except one — a power board — recently a single point had become inactive. Still manually turned on and off, just no remote control on one port. Sort of defeats the purpose. Cracked it open but nothing obvious is cooked or destroyed.
"Every single"…
my Kasa one still working fine , bought for $25 from bunning
$46.80 at bunnings
Damn, was thinking to price beat by 10%
18W "fast charging".
Ha.
What do you guys use these for at home? Plug in lamps and fans etc?
A 12V DC power supply and a 12V pump/solenoid is my use case for home watering/gardening.
Hey @BlueGlass
Can you tell us more about your setup? I want to automate watering but don't know where to start.
Ill try again, google 12V solenoid valve, and pair that with a 12V dc power supply.
Then use your imagination for how that could work.
Next step after that is a dc timer relay board, with float switches.
I have my TV and soundbar behind tapo so I turn off the power when I am not watching. Also have bed side table power behind a Tapo.
I use a single smart plug in my garage for all of my various battery chargers. I have it set so it automatically turns off after 5h, basically to reduce the risk of my garage burning down! You just push the button on top to turn it back on when needed
Word of caution with these, they can also be the cause of fires lol.
Have had a few smart boards (not this particular one) fail in one way or another that could potentional start fires.
Always still best to have them in a place that can be seen/heard regularly.
I've got my PC hooked up to one so I can start it remotely if I need to.
I've also got it through Google Home so I can say "Hey Google, Game On" just because I'm a nerd.
Also good for fans/heaters if you have an older one without a remote and want to switch them off after a certain amount of time etc.
How does the automation start the computer? A wake on LAN command of some sort?
I'd like to do something like this with my mITX case but not sure it can be "triggered" on
Check you bios setttings - you might be able to find a setting that powers on the PC after a power fail …
I have one of these and it consistently goes “unresponsive” in my HomeKit based network, requiring a power cycle to reconnect. It’s the only device I have that does this, I even have other devices in the same location (Eve & LIFX) that are rock solid. The P300 has the latest firmware, which made no difference.
Based on the other comments here it sounds like my experience is unusual, but I thought it was worthwhile sharing
I had issue with one board this year too, after having it work flawlessly for 3+ years… factory reset 3 times n it was back working again. Maybe try factory reset. Make sure u take screenshot of ur schedules, names etc for the power board before doing so. Once u reset, all settings r gone from Kasa app too. Hope that helps.
it consistently goes “unresponsive”
This happens to the smart plugs in one of my rooms, it means you have bad Wi-Fi coverage there. No problems with the same plugs in my other rooms.
The P300 is in a room right next to the wifi router and all of the other devices in that room (Eve, LIFX, Xiaomi) stay connected without issue. I have just factory reset it and set it up again so I’ll see how it goes.
Update: after a factory reset and re-adding it to HomeKit, it lasted about 12hrs before it disconnected. I checked the wifi signal at the location and it was -43dbm on the 2.4ghz network and -46dbm on the 5ghz - so effectively excellent signal strength.
Based on the other positive experiences here I have ordered another one of these from this deal to see hope that goes. Maybe I just have a faulty one.
Update: The new strip I ordered works well and I managed to get the old one working reliably too after another factory reset.
I think I discovered the issue: even when using HomeKit, which is local network, the tp link strip still needs to go out to the internet every few hours and if it can’t do that for 12 hours or so then it becomes unresponsive, to the point that even giving it back internet access and power cycling it wasn’t enough to fix it, I had to do a full reset with internet enabled. I had disabled internet access for the strip early on, after set up & firmware update. The full factory reset and running it with Internet access seems to be working.
I used an older version of this for automation on an aquarium to control CO2, lights and a few other bits of equipment. It worked really well in that application.
Also used mine for an aquarium setup . Only issue I had was setting it up as it is 2.4ghz only and I had to enable that on my router .
Not sure if these new ones are 5Ghz ?
These will still be limited to 2.4 and most don't play nice without a dedicated 2.4 wifi ssid for the app setup.
Can these accomodate kitchen appliances? I suspect the surge protection would be too weak, but damn I'd like to know over a month or so which of my air fryer/rice cooker/Instant POt/electric wok/sandwich press/Thermomix is using the most power
It doesn't appear this has energy monitoring, not all smart plugs/boards have that function.
I find with any of these 'smart' plug products, they all fail within a couple of years versus a regular old powerboard will last forever (seriously I still use powerboards in my house that are more than 20 years old). Won't be wasting my money again on these so called 'smart' products
My Belkin power board died after a storm..
They replaced it under warranty!
My cygnett "smart" power board refuses to connect to my wifi consistently even though laptops and watches and other things are fine in that room…
Not a fan at all of all these "smart" plugs. The moment internet connection plays up, or the modem, router, nbn equipment etc. Gets confused and doesn't turn on/off when needed. Have to monitor them manually all the time if the assigned function has performed. Happened to me so many time for example to put my phone charging and doesn't turn off charging when it was supposed to. Have no idea why these devices don't have an inbuilt hardware to remember set timers, why they constantly rely on internet connection.
Be smarter then these "smart" devices and don't leave any kind of food preparing, heating/cooling, plant watering, pet feeding etc devices.
I have one one my coffee machine to turn on and off at preset times and to turn on remotely before i get home if needed
I have several on outdoor lights also on timer.
I have one on an irrigation system that when away i can turn off when the bom.gov.au site shows we are getting plentiful rain
All have worked flawlessly
These were around as the Kasa KP-303 before TP-Link moved away from the Kasa brand to Tapo. I bought a few, they were $49 normally, but I'm sure I picked up one or two shortly after they were released for half that price (not sure what crazy promotion was on at the time, could have been a Prime Day sale). Perhaps try searching for Kasa instead of Tapo on OzBargain/camels3.
edit: Yep:
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/635323
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/635490